Explanatory Notes -- Romans 1:1-15

These Explanatory Notes go along with my more informal storytelling about Romans 1:1-15 on Sunday.
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The Prescript
^1:1Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, having been set apart for the gospel of God, ²which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures.

Letters in the ancient world usually followed a certain form. Their “prescript” – the opening part of the letter – usually began with a very brief: “Sender to Recipient, greetings.” Paul’s letters are thus somewhat unique in the way that he used this opening part of the letter to highlight key truths about himself (and the audience) that were relevant to what he was about to write about.

He starts by describing himself as a servant of Messiah Jesus. If he has recently written Philippians, that is the other place he started this way. He does refer to himself as a servant of Christ within the letters of 1 Corinthians and Galatians. Although I have not used the word slave here, we should remember that the term doulos had a stronger connotation than servant does in English. Paul belongs to God and is obligated to do God’s bidding. He does not belong to himself.

The fact that “Christ” comes before “Jesus” probably implies that Paul was thinking specifically of Jesus as king. Paul is a servant of King Jesus, the Anointed One of Israel, the Messiah.

He is the “herald” or “apostle” of Jesus the king. An apostle was someone sent with a message from someone else. Paul was sent into the world with a message from the king. First of all, that message was that Jesus had risen from the dead. As an apostle, Paul was an eyewitness of the resurrection (cf. 1 Cor. 9:1). There are no more apostles of this sort anymore. Paul was the very last (1 Cor. 15:8). Jesus has not appeared to anyone in the same way since.

This word of Jesus’ resurrection was good news. It was a “gospel.” A gospel was good news of an extraordinary sort. The gospel that Jesus preached was the coming arrival of the kingdom of God (e.g., Mark 1:15). By the time of Paul writing, some twenty-five years later, more details had been filled in. The Jesus movement now knew that Jesus’ death and resurrection were a key part of that coming kingdom – Jesus was in fact the King in that kingdom! Here is the truth that ties these things together. When Jesus rose from the dead, he ascended to the right hand of God. There, God seated Jesus next to him, enthroning him as king.

This wasn’t a last-minute decision by God. God had hidden this plan in the words of the Old Testament Scriptures. More than any other passage, the earliest Christians read Psalm 110:1 in this light. “The LORD (Yahweh) said to my Lord (the Messiah), sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.”

³concerning his Son, who came from the seed of David according to the flesh ⁴and appointed Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness from the resurrection of the dead – our Lord Jesus Christ.

These two verses form a little snippet of poetry, Hebrew style. Hebrew did not rhyme sounds in its poetry but thought. In “synonymous parallelism,” you said something. Then you said something similar or related. In this case, the poetic snippet presents two different ways in which Jesus was the Messiah: according to the flesh and according to the Spirit.

Paul certainly could have “gone poetic” on the spot. But there is at least one feature of these two lines that is curious. Rather than refer to the Holy Spirit as usual, he uses the phrase “Spirit of holiness,” which is unique here in the New Testament. However, it was not unique within Judaism. It appears both in the Old Testament in Hebrew (e.g., Ps. 51:11) and in other places like the Dead Sea Scrolls (e.g., 1QS 9.3).

These observations lead us to think that Paul is quoting something here, an early Christian poem or creed. Given the unique way of referring to the Holy Spirit, it was likely first composed in Aramaic. Quite possibly, it is an artifact of the worship of the Jerusalem church.

Ambrosiaster, who wrote in the late 300s, indicated that the churches at Rome had a “Jewish bent.” Raymond Brown and John Meier have wondered if this comment alludes to a more Jerusalem oriented form of early Christianity. That makes sense since Paul did not found the church. It was likely founded by individuals returning to Rome from Jerusalem or traveling there in the normal course of things.

What I am getting at is that it would be rhetorically effective to quote something out of Jerusalem to a church whose primary contact with Christianity was in Jerusalem.

There are two parts to the creed. The first recognizes Jesus’ human qualifications to be Messiah. He is a descendant of David in terms of his humanity – “according to the flesh.” (Note that “flesh” has no negative connotation here.) Here is very early testimony from Paul that Jesus had a Davidic lineage, an important verification of the Gospel tradition in Matthew 1 and Luke 3.

The second part is what would distinguish the early Christian understanding from mainstream Jewish thought. Jesus’ resurrection was understood to be part of his enthronement as cosmic Messiah. Those Jews who were looking for a Messiah expected him to be an anointed human. They did not expect him to die, let alone rise again.

Jesus’ death and resurrection were thus unexpected. But once Jesus rose from the dead, his resurrection was quickly interpreted in the light of Psalm 110:1. He rose from the dead and ascended to heaven where he was enthroned at God’s right hand as Son of God in power. God “begat” him as his Son (Ps. 2:7).

Was Jesus not Son of God before this point? We can perhaps think of him as an heir apparent before that point. He is Son but he has not yet taken the throne. He is not yet Son of God in power. This is an appointment he receives after his resurrection and ascension as he sits at the right hand of God (his “session”).

It is at this point that we most meaningfully begin to call him “Lord.” Acts 2:36 proclaims that Jesus’ resurrection means that God has made Jesus both Lord and Christ. The parallelism of Romans 10:9 equates calling Jesus Lord with believing that God raised him from the dead. The hymn of Philippians 2:9-11 similarly speaks of God giving Jesus the name “Lord” as God super-exalts him after his death.

The earliest Christology thus was not an incarnation Christology but a resurrection Christology. The earliest focus of Jesus’ Lordship, royal Sonship, and his identity as Christ found its locus in the resurrection.

⁵through whom we received grace and apostleship leading to the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles on behalf of his name, ⁶among whom are you also called of Jesus Christ.
Although most interpreters of Romans currently picture a mixed audience of Jew and Gentile Christian at Rome, the rhetoric of Romans itself seems far more focused on a Gentile audience. The Gentiles are Paul’s specific calling as apostle to the Gentiles (e.g., Rom. 15:16; Gal. 2:8).

Gentiles were thus the focus of his apostleship, powered by the grace of God. Grace of course is God’s unearned favor. There are a few misconceptions of what grace was in the ancient world. For example, you could solicit it. Sometimes grace is pictured as something that God irresistibly initiates with no involvement from us at all. This is not how grace was understood at the time. Similarly, grace could be cut off if the recipient responded in a completely inappropriate way. The core idea is that such favor is unearned. The other ideas are later add ons.

The phrase “obedience of faith” indicates that faith responds. It acts in obedience. It gives its allegiance. It is not passive in the Calvinist sense of irresistible grace. It participates in the grace.

The audiences in Rome are “among” these Gentiles. And they are also called like the other Gentiles to whom Paul has ministered. Paul was called to be an apostle. The Romans have also received a call from God to become part of the people of God.

⁷To all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be holy. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
This verse ends the prescript of the letter. The first six verses have expanded on the sender, Paul. Now in one verse Paul addresses his recipients and gives his characteristic greeting.

There were almost certainly multiple house churches in the city of Rome. This is certainly the case if Romans 16 was part of the letter sent to them. But even if not, Romans 16 gives us a sense of how many assemblies might be present in a large city like Rome. Some of the Roman churches may have been tenement churches. We have later evidence of churches in Ostia where individuals living next to each other took down the wall separating their houses in order to have a larger space for worship.

Paul indicates that they are beloved of God. This is of course true of all people and all believers. But although God loves us all, God loves us all as we are uniquely. They are also beloved as the churches of Rome.

They are called to believe and become part of the people of God. And they are called to be holy. They are called to be “saints.” The word saints means, “holy ones.” To be holy is to be set apart as belonging to God. And belonging to God implies a certain moral identity too – a life that does not let sin reign (e.g., Rom. 6:14).

The standard letter greeting was a single word, chairein – literally, “to rejoice.” However, from his earliest letters, Paul expanded this to “grace and peace.” The word grace (charis) is related to “greetings,” although giving it a theological twist that corresponded to one of Paul’s signature themes. The word peace corresponded to the Hebrew shalom. Paul’s greeting was thus a mirror of his mission to unite Jewish and Gentile believer into one body of Christ. It brought together a Greek and Hebrew greeting.

This grace and peace came from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Larry Hurtado has called this pairing a kind of “binitarianism.” However, the pair for Paul reflected God and his Messiah. God our Father is the One who is all in all (cf. Rom. 11:33-36; 1 Cor. 15:28). Jesus is his viceroy, his anointed king, the Son of God. He is Lord, enthroned in the heavens. He is the one who authenticates our reconciliation to God, which takes place “in Jesus’ name.”

The Thanksgiving
⁸First, I am thanking my God through Jesus Christ about you all because your faith is proclaimed in the whole world.
As we just mentioned, we can pray to God now through Jesus Messiah, for his death and resurrection has made it possible for us to be reconciled to God. He is the one who vouches for us, who testifies that we are in right standing again. Paul thanks God the Father through Jesus Christ.

The faith of the believers at Rome was apparently renowned through the whole world. Paul would have heard a good deal about their origins and story from Priscilla and Aquila when they first met at Corinth. That would have been some six or seven years previous. No doubt the couple would have stayed somewhat in touch with the happenings of the city even at a distance.

The Roman churches were a success story of the faith.

⁹For God is my witness, whom I worship with my spirit in the gospel of his Son as I am constantly making mention of you ¹⁰always in my prayers, asking if now somehow, I will succeed in the will of God to come to you.
The thanksgiving section of the letter normally followed the prescript. In it, it was customary in Paul’s letters to give thanks to God for the recipients in some way. Although these were normally features of Paul’s letters, we can assume that he meant what he said. He did pray for them regularly.

He prayed for them within the framework of his understanding of the good news. He prayed for them as he worshiped God the Father in his spirit. He worshiped God with thankfulness for the good news that Jesus was king. Although he did not plan to spend a long time with the Roman church, he believed that they had a role to play in Paul’s mission.

¹¹For I long to see you if I might impart some spiritual gift to you in order to strengthen you. ¹²And that is, to be mutually encouraged with you through both your faith and mine among one another.
Paul anticipated that a mutual edification would take place during his visit. It would be a spiritual gift exchange. Paul thought that God would use him to enrich their faith. And Paul believed that they would enrich his faith as well. This is the way the body of Christ works. We all have spiritual gifts that are meant to build each other up.

¹³Now I do not want you to be unaware, brothers [and sisters] that I often planned to come to you and I was prevented until now in order that I might have some fruit also among you just as also among the other Gentiles.
Paul has worked tirelessly spreading the good news in the eastern part of the Roman Empire. But he has apparently had Rome in the back of his mind all along. It was on his evangelistic bucket list. Yet he understood that God first wanted him to make sure that the gospel had permeated Asia, Macedonia, and Greece first. That task was now complete (Rom. 15:23).

1:14 implies that the audience is primarily Gentile. Paul is the apostle to non-Jews. He has had great fruit among the Gentiles of the east. Now he wants to have fruit among the Gentiles at Rome. Verse 14 clearly implies that Paul sees the audience as primarily non-Jew.

¹⁴Both to Greeks and barbarians, both to the wise and the foolish I am a debtor ¹⁵so the purpose for me is also to proclaim the good news to you at Rome.
The way that Paul expands on his target audience reinforces that the audience is non-Jewish. “Greeks and barbarians” refer to subcategories of Gentiles. These two groups align with stereotypes of the wise (Greeks) and the foolish (barbarians). This is the way many thought – there are the civilized Greeks and then there is everyone else.

It is time. Now is the time to present the good news to Rome too, even though his immediate audience has already believed. Paul thinks he will travel there freely after his visit to Jerusalem. Acts tells us it will not play out exactly that way. Still, he will see Rome soon enough.

Romans' Story: 1:1-15 -- the letter opening

Lead up to Romans
Romans 16 -- Paul's letter to Ephesus
Romans 15:14-33 -- situation of Romans
Romans 1:16-17 -- the point of the letter
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Paul, a servant of Messiah Jesus, called to be an apostle, having been set apart for the good news of God.

1. "I like it," Tertius said. "Most letters don't expand on who the sender is like that, but it's become your style, hasn't it?"

"Yes," Paul said. "It started as some reminders. For example, in one of the longer letters I sent here to Corinth, I wanted to remind you all that I was indeed an apostle. Then in my letter to the Galatian churches, I went really long, reminding them that my apostleship comes from God."

"So how long are we going to go as we expand on you as sender in this letter to the Romans?" Tertius asked.

"Let's remind them who Jesus is," Paul answered.

Paul's apostleship wasn't universally recognized. There were plenty of people in the Jerusalem churches who thought he was a false prophet. In fact, one of the reasons he felt led to write Romans was to head off any false rumors about him that might be in the water.

For example, his opponents were saying that he was telling Jews to stop keeping the Law of Moses. Because he was arguing that a right standing didn't come from keeping the Law, they said he was against the Law period. They said he taught, "Let's do evil so good may come."

It was definitely something he wanted to address in the letter. He was not in favor of sinning. He had not rejected the Law. Rather, like any good rabbi worth a shekel, he was arguing that it was the heart of the Law -- loving your neighbor -- that was the focus. And it was possible to do through the power of the Holy Spirit!

2. An apostle was someone who was sent. In the Christian context, it was especially someone who was sent as a witness to the resurrection. Jesus had appeared to numerous people after his resurrection. Paul was the last -- the last of the apostles.

The resurrection was good news -- it was a gospel. Jesus had preached the good news that the kingdom of God was soon coming to earth as it was in heaven. But his disciples had not yet understood that he needed to die for the sins of Israel and then rise from the dead. This was the great insight, the great revelation. Jesus' resurrection from the dead was in fact his enthronement as king. He rose from the dead and sat at the right hand of God in the skies.

After the resurrection, it had been obvious after the believers began searching the Scriptures. The Holy Spirit had helped them to see that all these things were part of God's plan. This was the good news that Isaiah and the other prophets had foreseen.

3. It is a gospel concerning his Son, who came from the seed of David according to the flesh and set apart as Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness from the resurrection of the dead: Jesus, Messiah, our Lord.

"That's magnificent," Tertius said.

"It comes from some of the hymn writing we did at Ephesus," Paul said. "There were some really inspired poets in the church there. This one captures nicely the two-fold nature of Jesus as Messiah."

Everyone knew that the Anointed One needed to be a descendent of King David. What the Holy Spirit had revealed is that the resurrection was Jesus' enthronement as Lord. It was right there in Psalm 110 -- the LORD had installed Jesus as Lord of the cosmos at his right hand.

Son of God was a royal title, after all. It was right there in Psalm 2, where God installs the king as his Son -- "Today, I have given you birth," they used to say when someone was installed as king.

4. "Now let's make the connection to the Gentiles," Paul said. "Most of the churches of Rome are made up of non-Jews."

"Really?" Tertius responded. "That's really interesting since Jesus is the Messiah of Israel."

"Yes, we'll want to address that enigma strongly in this letter," Paul said. "It is a mystery that, while Jesus is the Anointed One of Israel, more non-Jews are believing than Jews."

"But there are special reasons why the Roman churches are primarily Gentile," Paul continued. "Claudius ordered most of the Jewish believers in Jesus to leave Rome a few years ago. (To be honest, it seems like a lifetime ago, but it was only about seven years ago.) So, the church that was left was predominantly non-Jewish, although now that Claudius is gone, Jewish believers have been returning more and more."

... through whom we have received grace and apostleship leading to the Gentiles having faith and then obeying God's call.

"I want to emphasize to them that I am God's special envoy to non-Jews. That makes me their apostle on behalf of the name of Jesus.

5. "That's a pretty long expansion about you as the sender," Tertius said with a smile. "Can we say who we're writing to?"

"Sure," Paul answered.

... to those who are at Rome.

"Let's expand about them too," Paul said.

"Really?"

... beloved of God, called to be holy.

"And now your signature greeting?" Tertius asked.

"Go for it."

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

"Nice," Tertius said. "Captures the Hebrew shalom, adds something like the Greek hello, captures both God the Father as the source of grace and Jesus as our Lord, God's viceroy, his appointed king at his right hand."

6. "Time for the thanksgiving section," Tertius continued. "What shall we thank God for about them?"

"Well," Paul said, "everyone has heard about their faith. I also want them to know that I pray regularly for them, even though I've never been there. 

"Probably most important," Paul continued. "I want them to know that I have been wanting to visit them for a long time. It's just that circumstances -- and probably the Devil as well -- have prevented me."

"What's in it for them?" Tertius asked. 

"I think we will both mutually benefit," Paul said. "They have spiritual gifts that can minister to me, and my faith can minister to them too."

"But most of all," Paul continued, "I want them to know that it is my charge from God as apostle to the Gentiles to proclaim the gospel to them as Gentiles. I've preached to Gentiles all over the eastern part of the Roman Empire. I am a debtor to both Greeks and barbarians, to the wise and the foolish."

"And now it's their turn," Tertius said.

"Yes. Now it's their turn." 

Romans' Story -- Romans 1:16-17 (What's the point of the letter?)

Lead up to Romans
Romans 16 -- Paul's letter to Ephesus
Romans 15:14-33 -- situation of Romans
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1. We now have a fair sense of the setting of Romans. Now let's get down to writing.

In Romans 16:22, someone named Tertius greets the audience of the chapter as the writer of the letter. I suspect many of us come to that verse and are a little puzzled. "What? Isn't this Paul's letter? I've been reading Romans for sixteen chapters thinking it was Paul writing all this time?"

Of course, Paul is the voice of Romans. Tertius was the secretary, the scribe. In more technical terms, he was the "amanuensis."

Letter writing was a bigger deal back then by far than it is now. [1] We whip off texts and emails in seconds. Before email, an ordinary person had easy access to pen, paper, envelopes, and stamps. One of the blessings of the modern world is a postal system. Want to write someone halfway around the world? No big deal.

In the ancient world, the majority of people could neither read nor write. Papyrus and ink was far more expensive and less available than letter-writing tools today. Letters of Paul's length were very unusual, and they would normally be planned rather than written in one sitting. A copy would be made to keep as well as to send. And of course someone would need to take the letter to the destination. There was no Roman postal service for ordinary people.

For those who think Romans 16 was part of the letter to Rome, it is very common to think that Phoebe was the one who not only delivered the letter of Romans to Rome but who probably read it to the congregations of Rome -- perhaps house church by house church. [2] While I find this a very attractive possibility, my sense that Romans 16 was actually for Ephesus of course precludes it.

2. So, Paul and Tertius plan out the letter. It will have two main parts. For the bulk of the letter Paul will set forth how his mission to non-Jews, to the Gentiles, powerfully demostrates the righteousness of God. He will make a fun play on the word. When they first hear the phrase, they will think of the fact that God is righteous. That is to say, it is God's character to reach out to save his people and, indeed, the whole world. He is righteous.

Paul has his thesis clearly in mind. While some Christian Jews were embarrassed that so many Gentiles were coming to faith, Paul was in no way ashamed. "I like that," Tertius says. "I am not ashamed of the gospel" (Rom. 1:16), Paul sets it down. He was not ashamed of this good news that was for everyone -- non-Jews as well as Jews.

"Why aren't you ashamed," Tertius asks.

"Why, because this good news is the power of God for salvation," Paul answers. "And it is not just for Jews but for everyone who believes."

Salvation for him is primarily something that is future. He will say it in 13:11 -- our salvation is closer now than when we first believed. 

So, what was salvation for Paul? It was escaping the judgment of the world when Jesus Christ returned from heaven to establish his kingdom on earth. It was being rescued from this present evil age (Gal. 1:4). Yes, Paul believed we were delivered from the power of Sin now, but he usually did not talk of us "getting saved" now in the way we often do. [3]

Romans 5:9 puts it well: "How much more then now, since we have been justified by means of his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath." There you have it. Salvation is to escape the future, coming wrath of God when he judges the world. [4]

"The gospel is for everyone," Tertius notes to Paul. "But don't the Jews have any priority? Isn't that why you have so many opponents in Jerusalem?"

"Let's put in that it is for everyone but 'to the Jew first and also to the Greek'" (1:16), Paul says. 

"Great!" Tertius says and he reads back to Paul the thesis statement of the letter so far. "I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God leading to salvation for everyone who has faith -- the Jew first but also the Greek."

"Excellent," Paul says. 

It's hard for us to see it in English, but the word for faith in Greek (pistis) is closely related to the word for believing (pisteuo). It has more than one meaning, although they are related. Words normally mean one thing at a time (unless there's a double entendre). They do not mean all of their meanings at once.

I sometimes draw a stick figure on the whiteboard at this point. When pistis is focused on the "head" -- what we are thinking -- it tends to mean something like "belief." When it is focused more on the hands or feet -- what we do -- it tends to mean something like "faithfulness" (e.g., Rom. 3:3). Paul's normal usage is more heart-related and is more like "trust." And trust, in this case, probably has an overtone of allegiance. [5]

Final salvation is available to all who have faith, to all who trust in what God has done through Jesus and his blood. We will discover soon enough that Paul primarily thinks of us putting our faith in God the Father. Yes, we do trust in Christ too (e.g., Rom. 9:33). Jesus is the password. God the Father is "all in all" for Paul (1 Cor. 15:28). [6]

3. "What basis are you going to give in the letter for this bold claim," Tertius asks Paul.

"Why, it's grounded in the righteousness of God," Paul says. He begins quoting passages from the later chapters of Isaiah like 46:13 -- "I bring near my righteousness. It is not far off. And my salvation will not delay." But Paul especially was thinking of Psalm 98:2 -- "The LORD has made known his salvation. He has revealed his righteousness among the Gentiles."

So the concept of the righteousness of God was thoroughly known in Jewish circles. It was closely connected with the salvation God brought to his people from the Old Testament to the Dead Sea Scrolls of the Essenes. And Paul was now saying that God's same saving righteousness extended to non-Jews.

"I want to be clever with some of these terms we throw around," Paul says. "I want to keep them on their toes as they read."

"How so?" Tertius asked.

"For example," Paul continued. "God's faith or faithfulness leads to us responding in faith."

"Neat," Tertius responded. "So the righteousness of God is revealed 'from faith to faith'" (Rom. 1:17).

"Exactly," Paul said. 

"Is there a Scripture you can use to help convince those who are resisting these new ideas?"

"Yes," Paul said confidently. "Habakkuk 2:4: 'The person who is righteous will live in faith.' But I want to move the words 'by faith' to the middle so there is a double entendre: 'The person who is righteous by faith will live.'"

"I see," Tertius said excitedly. "On the one hand, there is what Habakkuk was talking about -- living in faithfulness to God whatever happend. But there is alos the idea that when you become right with God on the basis of faith, you will live!"

"You've got it," Paul said. "I want to play again on the phrase 'righteousness of God.' There is the normal meaning that God is righteous. But I want to move them to see that he makes us right with him too -- he justifies us."

Again, it is hard for us English speakers to see, but the word for righteous (dikaios) is from the same root as the word to justify (dikaioo). To "justify" thus means to "declare right" with God. When God justifies us, Paul would say, he considers us right with him, in good legal standing. Much more of that to come.

"So here is the whole thesis statement for the letter," Tertius said. "I am not ashamed of the good news, for it is the power of salvation to everyone who has faith, the Jew first and also the Greek. For in it, God's righteousness is revealed, starting with his faithfulness and resulting in our faith response. This is what Habakkuk wrote when he said, 'The person who is right with God on the basis of faith will live.'"

"It's a great start," Paul said.

[1] Two well-known studies on ancient letter writing in relation to the New Testament are Stanley K. Stowers, Letter Writing in Greco-Roman Antiquity (Westminster, 1986) and E. Randolph Richards, Paul and First Century Letter Writing: Secretaries, Composition, and Collection (IVP Academic, 2004).

[2] E.g., Scot McKnight, Reading Romans Backwards: A Gospel of Peace in the Midst of Empire (Baylor University, 2021) and Beverly Gaventa, Romans: A Commentary (Westminster John Knox, 2024), 430. I do not yet have Susan Eastman's new Romans commentary, but I suspect she takes the same position.

[3] We should note, for example, that the past (technically perfect) tense reference in Ephesians 2:8 is highly unusual among Paul's writings -- "by grace you have been saved." Even here, it is likely proleptic -- your salvation is a "done-deal" because you have trusted in Christ. In other words, while salvation is technically future, we can speak of it as something accomplished and remaining true today even though it has not happened yet.

[4] There is nothing wrong with our theology when we say, "I got saved ten years ago." It just isn't generally the way Paul talked. Paul also speaks of "being saved" twice (1 Cor. 1:18; 2 Cor. 2:15) in the present tense. But this seems anticipatory rather than a statement of process. In other words, the meaning is something like, "those of us who are scheduled to be saved."

[5] See Matthew Bates, Salvation by Allegiance Alone: Rethinking Faith, Works and the Gospel of Jesus the King (Baker Academic, 2017).

[6] Orthodox Christianity as it developed in the 300s does not see a hierarchy in the Trinity. Sometimes Paul's language of subordination is taken in relation to Jesus' humanity rather than his divinity. In general, I believe we need to have at least a small sense of doctrinal elaboration from the New Testament to the counsels if we wish to be orthodox.

3. Concentrated Romans (1:18-32)

Previously
1. Romans 1:1-15
2. Romans 1:16-17

Romans 1:18-32
A. Structure of Romans

• The book of Romans has two major halves. There is a logical cause-effect relationship between them signaled by the word "therefore" in 12:1. If the first half is true (1:16-11:36), then live the second half way (12:1-15:33).
• So to be overly simplistic, the first half is the theological half; the second is the practical half. The first half is teaching; the second half is preaching. The first half is doctrine; the second half is application. Probably more accurate to say, the first half is more exposition, the second more exhortation.
• In the first half, 1:16-17 are the key verses. They are a general statement that plays itself out in specifics in 1:18-11:36.
• Now with 1:18 we begin in earnest this first half of Romans (1:16-11:36).
• This first half of Romans consists of three sections. The first asks, "Who is justified?" (1:18-5:11). The second asks, "What about the Jewish Law?" (5:12-8:39). The third asks, "What about Israel?" (9:1-11:36).
• So 1:18-5:11 deals primarily with the subject of justification. Who is right with God? To be justified is to be declared in right standing with God. You are declared "not guilty." You are declared innocent in the divine court.
• This first section, "Who is justified?" also consists of three parts. The first establishes the universal problem that both Jew and Gentile have--both have sinned (1:18-3:20). The second reveals the universal solution--the offering of Christ and the possibility of justification by faith (3:21-4:25). The third is a swing section that at least in part concludes this first section (5:1-11).

B. Gentiles have sinned (1:18-32)

• The general lay out of the first section of Romans is: 1) Gentiles are going to fry (1:18-32), 2) Jews are going to fry too (2:1-29), and 3) all have sinned and are going to fry (3:1-20).
• It is easy to wonder if the first chapter of Romans is a kind of "sting" operation. He does not mention the Gentiles, but a self-righteous Jew (of course not all Jews were such) would probably enjoy Romans 1 just a little too much. While Paul is saying, "these foolish people did x, y, and z," a particular hypocritical Jew would be saying, "YES! Amen! Those Gentiles are going to fry! Preach it Paul!" But he is reeling such a person in so he can smack them with some bad news in chapter 2.
• So the sins that Paul selects in Romans 1 are stereotypical Gentile sins--idolatry and sexual immorality. The overlap in content and order between Paul's comments here and the book of Wisdom 13-14 is extensive enough that we probably have to conclude that Paul is drawing from that book. He doesn't mention it or call it scripture, of course. Wisdom is a book in the Apocrypha, in the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Old Testament but not the Protestant one.
• The flow of Romans 1 is: 1) Gentiles turned away from the true God and became idolaters, 2) therefore God abandoned them and they became sexually immoral, 3) this spiraling out of control ended in all sorts of wickedness.
• 1:18-23. Everyone should know what God is like. "The invisible aspects of God are clearly seen since the creation of the world--his power and divinity--so that they are without excuse" (1:20).
• This verse is one of the key bases for what is called, "natural revelation." It is the idea that "the heavens declare the glory of God" (Ps. 19:1). One should be able to apprehend some things by observing God's creation (Acts 17:26-27). Paul thus indicates that every person is without excuse--everyone should know that God exists.
• We thus get into some thorny theological questions. Can we come to God without the assistance of the Holy Spirit (Pelagianism)? What about those who have never heard or live in a place where Christ is the enemy--are they without excuse? Different traditions answer these questions differently, gluing passages together in different ways, supposing a different looking iceberg below the surface of the waters.
• Not all Wesleyans glue the same either. Given the nature of God as love, many Wesleyans want to believe that God "lightens everyone who comes into the world" (John 1:9). By God's "prevenient grace," he turns up the light for everyone at some point to see if they will want more grace. Christ is still the only basis for atonement and reconciliation, but God looks for heart movement, not head movement. Hearing the gospel and prayer increase exponentially the spiritual grace that moves toward God but, because of free will, cannot force a person to be saved. This scenario, while speculative, makes better sense of the love of God than, say, the Calvinist scenario, which supposes that we are all damned already and so God is not unjust to let the majority of the world go to hell without ever having any chance whatsoever.
• Idolatry is thus the reduction of God to something as ridiculous as an idol shaped like a reptile. Gentiles who thought themselves wise thus turned out to be fools to minimize God in this way. Of course there are many subtle ways to minimize God (e.g., American fundamentalism).
• 1:24-27. "God handed them over." There is a significant strand of Romans interpretation that highlights the connection between God's wrath and him letting humanity spiral out of control. That is to say, part of God's wrath is him simply letting us experience the consequences of our own turning from him. We see a hint of this idea in 1:27 where homosexual acts are said to contain within themselves their own punishment. It would be highly anachronistic to say this is AIDS or some sexually transmitted disease. Paul seems to be saying that the shame of the act itself is a punishment. However, it would seem that Paul's sense of God's wrath is bigger than merely experiencing the consequences of our rebellion.
• This passage is the central biblical text in relation to homosexual acts. There are at least six others. The Sodom and Gomorrah story in Genesis 19 proposed the rape of male angels by men (see also Judges 19). Jude 7 refers to this as a "going after different flesh." Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 prohibit a male-male sex act as part of the holiness codes of Israel. 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10 include active and passive homosexual acts in a list of either sinful individuals or practices.
• Paul does not give any context for such acts. We do not know for certain, for example, if the malakoi of 1 Corinthians 6:9 are male prostitutes (passive side of the act). We do not know if he pictures an activity done at a pagan temple (which would fit the flow of thought from idolatry to sexual immorality). His audiences presumably knew exactly what he was talking about.
• All these passages focus on sexual acts. The idea of a fixed sexual orientation that is not heterosexual is a modern concept. The Bible only discusses people who engage in an activity and thus these passages do not condemn individuals who have a particular temptation that is not acted upon mentally or physically. This is the only biblical passage that mentions female homosexual acts.
• Paul's broader point is that the Gentiles stand under God's judgment because they have not recognized God for who he truly is, thus they have devolved into idolatry and sexual immorality. This is his sting operation. A hypocritical Jew or conservative Gentile believer who is taking pleasure in this recounting of the wickedness of the Gentile is about to have the tables turned on him or her.
• 1:28-32. This is the climax of the chapter. As the Gentiles spiral out of control for not glorifying God as God, Paul goes on to list more behaviors on which God's wrath falls: envy, murder, strife, gossip, slanderers, disobedience to parents, a lack of love and mercy. 
• So Gentiles have sinned and are going to fry.

Original Meaning Translation: Romans 1:1-7

Wesleyan Publishing House had the great idea of publishing Bible studies along with my two books on Paul.  So a Bible study group might work through Philippians or 1 Thessalonians together, while the study leader reads through the main Paul book.  Now with the second Paul book in process, I need to write the first two Bible studies that will go with it, which cover Romans.

I'm not going to write them here, but I thought I might give my own translation of Romans as I worked through them.  I was tempted to do an original meaning dynamic equivalence or free translation.  But I decided to go extra formal, to give a fairly straightforward window into the Greek, even though it may not turn out to be very good English.  By the way, don't worry, the Bible studies use the NIV as the default translation, although because it is so bad at places, I sometimes shift to others as necessary.

Romans 1:1-7
1 Paul, a slave of Messiah Jesus, called [to be] an apostle, having been set apart (and still set apart) for the gospel of God, 2 which he promised earlier through his prophets in the holy writings, 3 concerning his Son, who came from the seed of David according to flesh, 4 who was appointed Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness through the resurrection of the dead, Jesus, Messiah, our Lord, 5 through whom we received grace and apostleship [leading] to the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, 6 among whom you yourselves are also called by Jesus Messiah, 7 to all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called [to be] holy ones.  Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Messiah.

All Have Sinned (5)

Previously on Paul.

... The very familiar verse Romans 3:23 sums up this entire section: "All have sinned and are lacking the glory of God."

The second half of this verse is often mistranslated or misunderstood. The New Living Translation, for example, translates it to say, "and fallen short of God's glorious standard," as if the problem Paul has in mind is our human inability to reach God's standard of absolute perfection. But this line of thinking misses Paul's understanding of glory as something humanity lost with Adam's sin and something we are regaining and will definitively regain at the resurrection.

We can make a good argument that Psalm 8 stands behind this verse, especially the part that says God created humanity with the intent of crowning us "with glory and honor" (Ps. 8:5). [1] When God created humans, he put them in a position of glory and honor within the creation. But when Adam sinned, he lost that glory for humanity. When we sin like Adam did, we also illustrate why we currently lack the glory God intended for us.

Part of our restoration, whether for believers who are alive at the time of Christ's return or for those he resurrects, involves "glorification," the restoration of humanity's glory. As Hebrews puts it, Christ is "bringing many sons to glory" (2:10). Or as Paul puts it, we are going to "share in Christ's glory," a "glory that will be revealed in us" (Rom. 8:17-18). Even in the meantime, we are already "being transformed into his likeness with ever increasing glory" (2 Cor. 3:18).

Both Jews and Gentiles have lost this glory. Ever since Augustine, Christians have tended to read the "all" in "all have sinned" in individualistic terms. All individuals have sinned. Certainly Paul would agree that all individual human beings have sinned. But this is a subtle shift from what Paul's argument was really about, namely, the fact that both Gentiles and Jews had sinned. "All" in the argument meant "all groups," not just Gentiles, but Jews as well. [2]

When Paul says "all," he is summarizing his earlier argument. For Jews hearing Romans, the first chapter would repeatedly cue in their minds the kinds of sins that Gentiles do. They "exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles" (1:23). The kind of self-righteous Jew Paul pictures in 2:17 would have "Amened" Paul at this point. "You preach it, Paul. Those sinful Gentiles are going to fry!"

Paul goes on in Romans 1:27 to speak of men who "abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another." Again, sexual immorality was one of those stereotypical sins Jews assumed all Gentiles were doing. Homosexual sex was just one consummate example of the kinds of sexual sins a self-righteous Jew might point out to emphasize how sinful those Gentiles were. "Yep, preach it, Paul. Those sinful Gentiles are going to fry!"

But Paul is engaged in a sting operation. The point of Romans 2 is that Jews are just as sinful as those stereotypically sinful Gentiles. In fact, Paul knows some Gentile Christians who have the Law written on their hearts (Rom. 2:15). They put the imaginary, self-righteous Jew Paul has been picturing to shame. They have "circumcised hearts," which makes them truly circumcised in God's eyes, while the condemning Jew Paul pictures proves to be uncircumcised in heart before God (Rom. 2:28-29).

So Paul's point in Romans 1:18-3:20 is that God's judgment is coming on all ungodliness, not only on ungodly Gentiles who worship idols and are sexually immoral, but on all Jews as well. All groups have sinned--Jews as well as Gentiles--and all equally face God's wrath. This is the problem we all face. And all can also participate equally in the solution: the faith of Jesus Christ!

[1] We know that Psalm 8 featured in Paul's thinking about Adam because he alludes to it in 1 Corinthians 15 when he says that God is putting everything under Christ's feet (1 Cor. 15:27). Hebrews 2:5-11, which probably was written by someone associated with the Pauline mission, may give us a fuller version of Paul's thinking here. You can see my understanding of it in my sense of what stands behind Romans 3:23b above.

[2] This was one of Krister Stendahl's main points in his groundbreaking lecture, "Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West."

All Have Sinned (4)

Previously on Paul. Not much time today. I'm off to Montreal as an observer at the biennial Association of Theological Schools meeting. We (Wesley Seminary at IWU) will apply for associate membership at the next meeting, Lord willing. On Friday the question of adjusting residency policies will be introduced. Currently the standard is two years, although some established schools like Asbury have an appropriate exception to require only one year. This is the direction I believe ATS needs to go for seminaries and the MDIV degree itself to revive and thrive. I am fairly confident this will be the decision at the next meeting.

_________
So the idea that everyone has sinned at some point in his or her life was not a new idea Paul came up with. Mainstream Jews would have completely agreed with Paul on this point, not to mention his Christian opponents. [1] Mainstream Jews would have completely agreed with Paul that it was only because of God's grace that Israel enjoyed the special relationship with God they had. They did not earn this special relationship even if God expected them to keep the Law to maintain it. And even if specific Israelites might fail him, God would preserve a righteous remnant within Israel forever.

The disagreement thus was not that "all have sinned" but on what the implications of that sin were and on what God in his righteousness was doing to address that sin. In a nutshell, Paul argued that Jewish sinfulness was no different from Gentile sinfulness, that Jews did not get a pass on their sins simply because they were Jews. Even more importantly, God had determined only one way to make things right with him, and it was not keeping the Jewish Law. The faithful death of Jesus Christ was the only way God was accepting at this time.

Paul spends almost the first three chapters of Romans spelling out the problem and implications of the fact that "all have sinned." After the usual introductory material of 1:1-15 and the key verses of 1:16-17, Paul dedicates Romans 1:18-3:20 to the sin problem of humanity both for Jews and non-Jews alike. [2] The very familiar verse Romans 3:23 sums up this entire section: "All have sinned and are lacking the glory of God." [3]

...

[1] For example, one Qumran hymn says, "What is flesh compared to this? ... He is in iniquity from his maternal womb, and in guilt of unfaithfulness right to old age" (1QH12.29-30).

[2] The "prescript" or greetings of Romans are in 1:1-7. Then the "thanksgiving" section continues at least through verse 15, where Paul thanks God for the Romans. 1:16-17 are then the key verses of the letter.

[3] My translation.

Explanatory Notes: Romans 1:16-17

1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel...
This verse marks the transition out of the thanksgiving section and into the body of the letter of Romans proper. Romans 1:16-17 constitute the basic thesis of Romans, a general statement that is played out especially in the first eleven chapters. The conjunction "for" marks the transition in section. Paul is ready to preach to those at Rome. Why? Because the gospel holds the possibility of salvation for them.

The ancient world was an "honor-shame" culture, rather than a "guilt" culture such as most of the Western world today. Westerners tend to be individualists. We formulate our identities and our sense of self as individual entities. We "have it our way" at restaurants, who oblige us by holding the pickle or holding the lettuce. "Special orders don't upset us."

We date, sometimes for very long periods of time, because as highly differentiated individuals, it can take a while to figure out if we are going to be compatible with someone else for the rest of our lives. We also feel comparatively free to break up with our spouses if it doesn't work for us as individuals. We each decide as individuals what we believe, and we value the person who is true to their beliefs, even when everyone else disagrees.

We are introspective. We can look deep inside ourselves to ask why we feel the way we do and why we acted the way we did. We feel guilt--a sense of whether we have acted according to our individual values.

On the other hand, we do not feel shame, which is a devaluation of ourselves because we have not acted according to the values of the groups to which we belong. The biblical worlds were group cultures, not individualistic cultures like the Western world. Marriages could be arranged before a person was even born because a person's identity was largely fixed at birth. You were born male or female into a family with a certain status that belonged to a particular people group.

Unlike the modern, Western world, where we prize the tale of the "self-made man" or the "rags to riches" story, it was generally expected that a person would be born and die with the same basic status in life. If your father was a carpenter, the expectation was that you would likely be one too. Your identity was embedded in the groups to which you were born into and thus belonged.

Shame in this context is thus the sense that one has not lived up to the values of the groups that constitute your identity. When Paul says he is not ashamed of the gospel, he no doubt alludes to the fact that many Jews--one of the major groups that constituted his natural identity--would have seen the gospel as discordant with Jewish values. After all, "cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree" (Gal. 3:*).

But Paul's value system and identity-defining group has changed. He is not ashamed of the gospel because in the conflict of his identity, the fact that he is "in Christ" has won out.

He is not ashamed of the gospel. We have already seen in 1:3 that this particular good news is "concerning His Son." It is the good news that Jesus is the Lord, Jesus is the promised king through whom God will bring His reign back to the earth.

... for it is the power of God for salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
The good news entails the possibility of salvation. Salvation for Paul is primarily future oriented. It is about escaping the coming wrath of God on the Day of Judgment. Paul can speak of being saved in the present tense. Ephesians 2:8 even speaks of being saved in the past tense.

But Paul does not use salvation language literally in reference to something we escape now. There are things that he believes we escape now, like the power of Sin. But he does not use salvation language in this way. The power of the gospel for salvation is the power of Jesus Christ to rescue us from the coming visitation of God's judgment on the world.

This salvation came first to the Jews. Jesus came into the world as a child of Israel and the Messiah is of the Jews (Rom. 10:*). But essential for Paul's understanding of the gospel is that the Jew is not thereby one bit more worthy of God's salvation, even if they have a special place of honor in that kingdom. The gospel is also to the Greek, who here represents the entirety of the Gentiles, non-Jews.

1:17 For in it [the gospel], the righteousness of God is revealed...
The interpretation of the phrase "the righteousness of God" in recent times has a long and complicated history. The story starts with the Roman Catholic understanding of the phrase in the late Middle Ages, namely, as a reference to the justice of God as he distributes it to the world. The Latin Vulgate rendered the phrase as the iustitia Dei, and it was thus all to easy to understand the verse to say that the "justice" of God was revealed in the gospel, just as the next verse talks about the wrath of God being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness.

Martin Luther recognized another possible way to take the phrase, namely, in reference to a righteousness from God, which is the way some translations have actually rendered the phrase (e.g., the New International Version). Does not Paul champion justification through faith in Romans, dikaioo being the verb "to justify" and dikaiosyne being the noun "righteousness"? Should we not then understand the "righteousness of God" to be none other than the righteousness God assigns to us on the basis of our faith rather than our works?

For Luther such righteousness was an "imputed" righteousness, for we are truly sinners. It is a legal fiction in which God considers us legally innocent even though we are in truth guilty. Some later (e.g., John Wesley) would argue that such righteousness is not only imputed but truly imparted through the Holy Spirit as well so that we can truly become blameless ethically as we walk in the Spirit.

However, the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the late 1940's triggered a re-examination of the phrase in the light of its Jewish background, and Romans scholarship has returned to the conclusion that whatever the phrase, "the righteousness of God" might mean exactly, it refers primarily at least in this verse to an aspect of God or His action rather than to justification in relation to humanity. Ernst Käsemann took "the righteousness of God" to mean something like the "justifying of God," which for him was God's action to set the whole cosmos right, to justify it.

If we read the phrase against the backdrop of the Old Testament and contemporary Jewish literature of the day, we end up seeing it as a reference to God's righteousness, which in the later part of Isaiah (40-66) appears regularly in parallel with the salvation of God. Isaiah thus tempts us to understand the phrase as God's propensity to save, especially His people, but now also the whole world. One scholar translates the phrase well when he thinks of it as God's "saving righteousness."

Recent days have seen a return to reading Jesus and Paul in their Jewish contexts. The result is an appropriate recognition of Israel as the starting point for understanding how Paul conceptualized the people of God. However, it is perhaps unwise to think of God's righteousness as His covenant faithfulness to Israel, with some highly developed theology of the Gentiles inclusion in Israel. It is not that we cannot find statements in Paul to support these elements of a reconstructed Pauline theology. It is only that those scholars who advocate this reconstruction probably have made a tidier system out of Paul's thought than Paul himself and thus they run the risk of skewing some of Paul's comments by their system.

... from faith [leading] to faith, as it is written, "The righteous person on the basis of faith will live."
The expression "from faith to faith" is variously interpreted. Given a similar grammatical expression in 2 Corinthians *, some have taken it something like "completely by faith" or as the NIV translates it "by faith from first to last." However, with the shift back to understanding the "righteousness of God" in terms of God's righteousness, perhaps most scholars see the phrase as a reference to a movement from God's faith, His righteous faithfulness, to the human response of faith. A smaller group of scholars sees the progression here from Jesus' faithfulness to our faith.

Paul then quotes Habakkuk 2:4, which is a foundational verse for him. We should understand Paul to be alluding to this verse every time he uses the expression, "from faith," or as we have translated it here, "on the basis of faith." The phrase is thus a shorthand way of referring to Paul's understanding of this verse, namely, as teaching that it is the person who is righteous on the basis of his or her faith who will live, who will be resurrected.

Some scholars further see in this verse an allusion to Jesus' faith, taking the phrase "the Righteous One" as a reference to the Messiah and thus a prophecy of Jesus' resurrection on the basis of his faith. This is certainly possible, although it is difficult to know on the basis of this verse alone. We would argue that Paul sees the justification of both humanity and Jesus as being on the basis of faith, drawing on 2 Corinthians 4:13 as a key to this underlying pattern of thought in Paul. Thus it is both the faith of Jesus and the faith of believers that has justified, Jesus with true innocence and believers because they are in the faith of the Son of God (Gal. 2:20).

Sunday Explanatory Notes: Romans 1:1-15

My current intention is to post selected explanatory notes on Sundays and Wednesdays in relation to the two upper level Bible classes I am teaching this semester. For Tuesday, here are some comments in relation to Romans 1:1-15.

I can't aim to be complete--too much burying me. [comment on contract Ways Never Parted removed]

So much of this section I have just translated without comment. Please pardon occasional notes indicating blanks I would want to fill in if I ever published these notes.
__________
1:1 Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called [to be an] apostle, separated for the gospel of God,
The Pauline authorship of Romans is not questioned. No cowriter is mentioned, although one Tertius mentions himself in 16:22 as the writer of at least that chapter.

***

Verse 3 will make it clear that the primary content of the "good news" relates to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah, the promised king and Lord.

1:2 ... which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures,
The early Christians scoured the Old Testament looking for explanations and information relative to the kind of messiahship that Jesus turned out to have. They were not, after all, expecting the Messiah to die on a cross! Nor is it clear that they were expecting Jesus to come back from the dead. Very early on we can imagine that they found the host of passages in the Old Testament that they now understood to be prophecies about Jesus and the manner of his messiahship.

What were some of these passages? Psalm 110:1, Psalm 22, ***

1:3 ... concerning His Son, who came from the seed of David, according to the flesh,
It is here that Paul makes clear what the content of the gospel is. It is the good news about the Son of God, the promised king. A "gospel" in the Roman world was an announcement of extraordinarily good news, such as the birth of a successor to the throne or a key victory against the enemies of the Romans. The good news of God is that "our God reigns" and that He reigns through the kingship of Jesus Christ.

Verse 3 gives the human part of the resume of the Son of God. In terms of the Old Testament, the Messiah would be a descendant of David, in the royal line. It is, after all, the promise of a continued Davidic king that serves as the ultimate basis for Jewish messianic expectation in the first place. 2 Samuel 7:14 tells of God saying to David about Solomon: "I will be his Father; and he will be my son... ***.

Old Testament passages such as these (e.g., Ps. 2; perhaps even Isa. 12:1; 10*) looked to a human successor to David's throne, a descendant of David "according to the flesh." It is thus no surprise that there were other individuals in this period who either tauted themselves or were promoted as the Messiah. The New Testament understanding of the Messiah is thus a significant upgrade from what we might consider the average Jewish expectation of the time.

1:4 ... [and] was appointed Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness, on the basis of his resurrection from the dead,
These two verses have a symmetry to them, and they stand somewhat loosely to the flow of Paul's thought. They are introduced with a characteristic "who" and have somewhat unique phraseology for Paul, like "Spirit of holiness" instead of "Holy Spirit." For this reason, a good number of scholars suggest that Paul is quoting a common Christian expression of faith here, rather than simply writing his own words.

This second half of the "creed," or whatever it might have been, points to a much greater understanding of Jesus than other messianic expectation. "According to the flesh," Jesus had the qualifications to be Messiah because he was of the line of David. But the actual "appointment" of Jesus to divine Sonship--at least "in power"--was at the point of his resurrection. This timing fits with a host of other New Testament passages that most meaningfully identify Jesus as the Son of God and Lord at the point of his resurrection (e.g., Acts 2:35; 13:33; Rom. 10:9; Phil. 2:9-11; Heb. 1:5). In particular, they present Christ's exaltation to God's right hand as a kind of enthronement as cosmic king over all the creation.

... Jesus Christ, our Lord,
The person about which all these things apply is none other than Jesus, a man who had only recently walked the earth, an astounding claim. This Jesus is Christ, Messiah, king of Israel. And he is "our Lord," a term that occasionally has overtones of YHWH in the Old Testament for Paul.

1:5 ... through whom we have received grace and apostleship, leading to the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles in relation to his name,
As Paul will say in Romans 15*, he did not see himself as apostle to Jew and Gentile equally. He is the apostle to the Gentiles, sent with a commission by God to bring them the good news of the reign of God in Christ. The one "funding" his mission is none other than Jesus the Lord, who has graced Paul to go on this ambassadorial journey.

The desired outcome of the mission is the obedience of the Gentiles, an affirmation of the name of Jesus as the king. Faith here seems to be closely related to obedience. Faith is virtually equated with obedience to the gospel.

1:6 ... among whom you are also called by Jesus Christ,
The implication of this statement would thus seem to be that the audience is primarily Gentile in composition. The audience is among all the Gentiles whose faith in his lordship Jesus is seeking. The strongest argument for a "mixed" audience of both Jew and Gentile is Romans 16, which includes several Jews. However, the text of Romans itself points toward a predominantly Gentile audience.

1:7 ... to all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called [as] holy ones,
This is the second part of the opening "prescript." The opening of an ancient letter was usually quite brief: X to Y, greetings. Paul uncharacteristically expands his prescripts will all sorts of qualifying statements and expressions.

So this is the "to Y" part of the prescript. *** placing of Romans in Paul's ministry

... grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the "greetings" part. *** Paul's typical greeting.

1:8 First, I am giving thanks to my God through Jesus Christ about you all, because your faith is being reported in the whole world.
Following the prescript of an ancient letter, there was characteristically a "thanksgiving" section where the author gave thanks to some god. Paul's letters also characteristically either give thanks to God or launch into a blessing of God after the prescript, with the notable exception of Galatians. The thanksgiving of Romans seems to run from verse 8 to 15.

When was the church founded, Claudius and AD49, death of Nero, AD54 ***

1:9-10 For God is my witness--whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel about His Son, as I constantly am making mention of you--[that I am] always in my prayers asking if somehow at last I will find good passage in the will of God to come to you.

1:11-12 For I long to see you that I might impart some spiritual gift to you so that you might be strengthened. And this is for the mutual encouragement among you through the faith in one another, both your [faith] and mine.

1:13 Now I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, that I have often purposed to come to you, and I was hindered until the present time,
It is interesting to see that Paul had hoped to visit Rome sooner than he did. We can wonder when and what sorts of things hindered him. ***

... so that I might have some fruit among you, just as [I have] also [had] among the other Gentiles.
Here is yet another indication that the audience is predominantly Gentile or at least that it is the Gentile Christian constituency at Rome to which Paul is predominantly writing. We must thus be very careful to hear Romans in this way, as a letter directed primarily at Gentiles. It is all too easy--even for scholars--to take their eye off reading Romans inductively to inserting all kinds of extraneous presuppositions into their reading of a biblical text.

1:14 Both to Greeks and barbarians, both to the wise and the ignorant, I am a debtor,
Again, we notice that Paul does not divide his mission up into Jews and Gentiles here but into types of Gentiles: civilized and uncivilized. ***

1:15 ... so my purpose is also to proclaim the gospel to you who are at Rome.
Again, Paul includes the audience within the stream of Gentiles that he has been discussing in the thanksgiving section of Romans. With this verse, we might say that the thanksgiving section comes to an end.

Sin in Romans 1

Last summer I never finished looking at sin in Romans--the semester started and so it went. However, Hebrews class this week has raised questions about what sin is again, this time in relation to Jesus. What exactly does the author of Hebrews have in mind when he says that Christ was tested in every way similarly without sin?

I don't propose an answer to that today, but I do want to finish running through Romans eventually, so a revisiting of Romans 1 today.

1. (1:18) The wrath of God is revealed against ασεβεια (ungodliness) and αδικια (unrighteousness).

Certainly sin is in view. What is it? It primarily seems to look toward the practice of idolatry (1:23). Paul invokes culpability on the basis of knowledge--they should have known better (1:19-21). There seems to be a sense that, at least corporately, those nations that have rejected God are involved in a known transgression--they knew the good they ought to do but did not do it.

Romans 1 treats the "sins" in the rest of the chapter as derivative. Because of their idolatry, God "gave them up" to sexual sins and many other types of sin as well. 1:32 reiterates culpability again--"although they knew the right--that those who practice such things are worthy of death--they not only did them but approved of those who did them."

Again, Paul is making a corporate rather than individual argument. What is interesting to me is the apparent importance of knowledge in culpability here. There does seem to be enslavement in the chapter as well--"God gave them up in their passions" (1:24, 26, 28). So we can perhaps speak of two views of sin in this chapter by Paul 1) ultimate culpability on the basis of intention and 2) intermediate slavery to sin as a result of prior intention.

Questions emerge of course. Is prior individual intention or prior corporate intention the main source of enslavement to sin in Paul's mind? To what extent is this a "parable" of sin in humanity and to what extent is it a blueprint? Idolatry as Paul has in view does not exist in most of our worlds, yet the other behaviors of the chapter do. Does homosexuality generally follow on idolatry and did Paul really mean to suggest something of this sort.

Questions, questions...

Sunday Romans: 1:1-7 (Wk3: Dunn, Wright, Fitz, W3)

Today I glance at another set of commentaries. I'll do one more week after this one, since I have several more I haven't glanced at yet (like Stuhlmacher, Barth, Stott). With today's I hit what I consider some of the key original meaning commentaries. As such they may not contribute too much to the Arminian-Calvinist issue.

J. D. G. Dunn (Romans 1-8, Word Biblical)
Dunn has some interesting things to say about what it might mean to be called. The word in a weak form could mean to invite, such as to invite to dinner. A stronger meaning would be to summons, and certainly the call of God is much stronger than an invitation. Dunn goes further to suggest that "the called" in Paul's parlance are "those whose lives had been determined by God's summons" (8).

As to Paul being called as an apostle, Dunn says, "Within that [broader] calling, which is one of the features of all those belonging to Christ, Paul thinks of a calling to a specific task (1:1; 1 Cor. 1:1), though in both cases he takes care to ensure that the idea of a specific calling cannot be separated from the calling of all (1:6-7; 1 Cor. 1:2...)" (8-9).

Dunn has some very interesting thoughts on the phrase "called to be saints" also. He points out how striking it would have been to Jews to call uncircumcised Gentiles as "set apart as holy" in the way sacrificial items were set apart for God.

N. T. Wright (New Interpreter's Bible, Abingdon)
I found Wright's discussion of these verses excellent and relatively clear (which he isn't always). We will discuss some of his thoughts on what the gospel is tomorrow in our coverage of Piper.

Particularly interesting was his discussion of what "according to the flesh" might mean. Wright strongly disagrees that this might mean merely that Jesus was of the seed of David in terms of his humanity. Flesh, Wright argues, always has some negative connotation for Paul.


For our purposes, I am mainly interested in what he does with the language of calling in this section. For 1:2 he takes Paul's calling as a matter of his "conversion." " 'Call' in Paul's writings usually refers, not to the specific vocation of which a Christian may gradually become aware, but to the moment when the gospel message of Jesus first makes its saving impact on him or her" (415). "Here," Wright argues, "Paul's 'conversion' was also his 'vocation' to be the apostle to the nations." In other words, it refers not to some decree before creation but to something God did at a particular point of Paul's life.


In 1:7, Wright takes calling as "called to belong to Jesus Christ" (420). As before, Wright takes this calling in relation to the point in time when the audience was called: "the 'call' was God's powerful word, creating new life--creating, indeed, the response it sought, as a word of love is always capable of doing."


Joseph Fitzmyer (Romans, Anchor Bible)
Fitzmyer has some good thoughts on the name "Paul" in a Roman context, as well as other good thoughts on the "creed" of 1:2-3.

But for our purposes, his most significant thoughts are his understanding of "among whom you too were called to belong to Jesus Christ." Fitzmeyer takes this in terms of the fact that "their vocation is to belong to Christ along with Israel."

Witherington (Paul's Letter to the Romans) also notes that Paul "uses terms formerly used of Israel, namely 'beloved' and 'called,' even of his largely Gentile audience, because he believes that Jew and Gentile united in Christ and in his gospel are the eschatological people of God and stand in continuity with Abraham and OT Israel" (37).

I think Fitzmyer and Witherington are on to something here, namely, that when Paul says the Romans are "called as saints," the most striking thing is that he primarily has Gentiles in mind. These Gentiles are a part of God's holy people just as Jewish believers are. The point is not that they are called and others aren't, but that along with others God has summoned, they are too.

Sunday Romans: 1:1-7 (Week 2: Calvin, Moo, Schreiner)

This is my second week on Romans 1:1-7.

For my initial translation, see last week's post. I also started a Romans interlinear that I plan to fill out as we go. Last week I looked over John Wesley and Adam Clarke's thoughts on these verses. This week I am looking over 1) John Calvin on Romans 1:1-7, 2) Douglas Moo's The Epistle to the Romans, and Thomas Schreiner's Romans.

Calvin
I will be the second to last to admit that Calvin is a far superior interpreter of Scripture in context to Wesley. He did not of course have the tools available that we do. Nor did he have the benefits of this last century's discoveries and insights. So it is not difficult for a bright MDiv student today to be superior to him--after all, the MDiv student can read Calvin himself and then move beyond to all the subsequent interpreters. But there is the real possibility that, were he interpreting today, he would be counted among the greatest interpreters of our time.

Which does not of course mean that his theology was more correct than Wesley. But this is not my topic for today.

Calvin amazingly says this of Paul as "called apostle": "I cannot agree with those who refer this call of which he speaks to the eternal election of God; and who understand the separation, either that from his mother’s womb, which he mentions in Galatians 1:15, or that which Luke refers to, when Paul was appointed for the Gentiles: but I consider that he simply glories in having God as the author of his call, lest any one should think that he had through his own rashness taken this honor to himself."

So Calvin does not see the calling language of Paul's apostleship as a matter of his predestination to salvation.

On the other hand, Calvin says this of Romans 1:3:

"Ye are the called of Jesus Christ, etc.
He assigns a reason more nearly connected with them — because the Lord had already exhibited in them an evidence by which he had manifested that he had called them to a participation of the gospel. It hence followed, that if they wished their own calling to remain sure, they were not to reject the ministry of Paul, who had been chosen by the same election of God.

"I therefore take this clause, 'the called of Jesus Christ,' as explanatory, as though the particle 'even' were inserted; for he means, that they were by calling made partakers of Christ. For they who shall be heirs of eternal life, are chosen by the celestial Father to be children in Christ; and when chosen, they are committed to his care and protection as their shepherd."

As we will see, I question whether Paul, as Calvin, thought of predestination language primarily in "deductive" terms. God called before the foundation of the world these specific people; therefore, they became partakers of Christ. Predestination language in Paul, I would argue, functions "inductively" as it relates to specific people. You are here among the people of God; therefore, God chose you.

This distinction makes a great deal of difference when it comes to how we are to apply the doctrine of predestination. It cannot come first as the governing element in our theology. It rather must come last, as "after the fact" language.

Moo and Schreiner
Moo has lots of great little tidbits in his comments on Romans 1:1-7, and Schreiner's treatment is quite good too. The commentaries on Romans are so big it is exasperating, and they all cover much of the same material. My task here isn't to do anything like a full commentary (maybe I'll add links to the interlinear the final week of each cycle). I'm principally looking at issues relating to Calvinism and Arminianism.

1. Moo makes no real deal about language of calling in these verses. He gives ascent to Leon Morris' claim that Romans is ultimately a book about God (43). Schreiner similarly goes against the majority view that the phrase "the gospel of God" refers only to the gospel from God (a "genitive of source") (37). Schreiner thinks Paul also means his audience to hear that it is a "gospel about God," a double entendre.

Certainly God is for Paul the "all in all," and Paul spreads the gospel "on behalf of His name" (Schreiner, 35 in reference to Rom. 1:5). But I also wonder if these are reflections of "Westminster Catechism Colored Glasses" (the chief end of man is to glorify God..."). We'll have to track this question of emphasis, though let no one suggest we question that God is indeed all in all. The question is not whether God is in fact the only intrinsically Worthy of existence.

The question is
1) exegetical--what is the primary topic of Romans--God? salvation? Christ? and
2) the nature of God's love--what does it mean to say that God loves the world.

Could it be that Paul's focus in Romans 1-11 is not primarily on the glory or sovereignty of God but rather on defending his understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ, particularly as it relates to the Gentile?

2. Moo and Schreiner, following Calvin, consider the phrase "grace and apostleship" as what is called a hendiadys, "gracious apostleship." In other words, God's calling of Paul to be an apostle was an act of His grace. Fair enough.

3. Both take the phrase "obedience of faith" in much the way I do--"obedience that comes from faith," although Schreiner allows for additional nuances to this that are not problematic from my perspective (I refer to the idea of a genitive of apposition).

4. My chief question about their interpretation of these verses comes from their language of the redefinition of the people of God.

Moo: "Paul implies that they are God's chosen people; for both phrases echo OT designations of Israel. In so transferring language used of Israel in the OT to Christians" (54-55).

Schreiner: "Paul implicitly redraws the lines of what constitutes the true people of God" (45) and "Since Jesus is the true Israel... those who belong to him constitute the people of God" (36).

By the way, I've been intrigued by a number of positive statements by Schreiner in relation to N. T. Wright interpretations in the small space of his interpretation of verses 1 through 7. I'll be interested to track his relation to Wright. He dedicates his commentary to John Piper, who has just written a book against Wright. Interesting...

I agree with these commentators that Paul redefines the people of God in a way that is not limited to Israel. The question in my mind is whether ethnic Israel remains the "base" of the people of God or whether the people of God have been completely redefined as a "third race," a neutral race that truly shows no priority to ethnic Israel at all.

I have serious questions about whether this is the case or whether, as Schreiner and Wright believe, Jesus is the true Israel. I am open, but fail to find this theme in Paul.

Dunn, Wright, Fitzmeyer next week...

Romans Sundays

In a slight diversion from the lectionary, I hope to spend a little Sunday time each week in Romans. This will take some time...

I am primarily interested in how the Wesleyan tradition might read this text. Of course the original meaning is the original meaning--no changing of that for any tradition. But the significance of the Romans text differs from tradition to tradition.

There's already plenty out there on Romans from other theological perspectives. I think of Ben Witherington's recent comments on a forthcoming New Testament Theology--almost certainly that of Thomas Schreiner of Louisville Southern Baptist Seminary (see Witherington's initial reaction). Of course I don't think Schreiner or his close friend John Piper even has the original meaning right.

So today I give my translation of Romans 1:1-7, the prescript of the letter, and will be reading the comments of Wesley and Adam Clarke on that passage. I'm also creating a Romans interlinear at the same time, which of course can be expanded with my own explanatory notes in time.

So we begin with Romans 1:1-7. I'll be reading different commentators for a few weeks on this passage.
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Romans 1:1-7 (The Prescript)
Paul, a slave of Messiah Jesus, called [by God to be] an apostle, set apart for this wonderful message from God, which God promised earlier through his prophets in the holy Scriptures. This message is about God's Son, who came from the seed of David in terms of his flesh. But he was enthroned with power as the Son of God by the Spirit of Holiness, because he rose from the dead--Jesus [the] Messiah, our Lord.

It is through [Jesus] that we have received grace and a commission to take the good message to all non-Jews in his name, so that they might obey and have faith. You are among them--even you are called by Jesus Messiah.

So I write to all who are in Rome, loved by God, called to be holy ones. Grace and peace be to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Messiah.
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Perhaps the most "Wesleyan" thing that Adam Clarke has to say comes in his treatment of the word "slave" (doulos). Here he speaks of Paul's complete surrender to Jesus Christ. Indeed, we should remember when we get to Romans 6 that Paul has already identified himself as a slave of Jesus Christ, which is not to be a slave of sin but a slave of righteousness.

The phrase, "Spirit of Holiness" does not have any particular Wesleyan import, although Clarke does discuss the phrase. As I may mention next week, it seems a non-Pauline way of referring to the Holy Spirit.

Of some interest, although neither Wesley nor Clarke discuss it, is the expression "the obedience of faith." Faith here seems to issue in obedience, "the obedience that comes from faith." Faith thus does not contradict action. Its opposite is disbelief and disobedience, not works.

The expression, "called to be saints" or "called as holy ones" is not a call to become holy. Rather, all who are believers are holy, set apart to God.

I will explore some other aspects of these verses next Sunday. But these seem to be the aspects of these verses that are of greatest interest to those in the Wesleyan tradition.

Sin in Romans 1

The "proposition" of Romans appears in 1:16-17 with statements about how the gospel is the power of salvation for all who have faith and that it reveals the righteousness of God, a reference to God's righteousness, particularly as it is revealed in his salvation.

But the real points of interest for me begin at Romans 1:18. The wrath of God, Paul says, has been revealed against ungodliness (asebeia) and unrighteousness or injustice or wrongdoing (adikia) of humans who hold the truth in unrighteousness. Some view this wrath as a kind of "realized wrath," a wrath that is somewhat passive on God's part as he "abandons" various parties to the consequences of their sins.

To be sure, some of this thinking is present in the chapter. But Paul goes on in chapter 2 in a way that implies that this is only half the story. There will be a real judgment, Paul says, in the future (Rom. 2:5). So this reading turns out to be a subconscious attempt to avoid parts of Paul's thinking that some find distasteful. In my method, that is a matter for theology. Paul meant what he meant and we just have to deal with it.

Interestingly enough, in 1:19-23 seems to imply culpability on the part of humans because they should have known better. In other words, Paul brings consciousness of the truth into the equation of moral culpability for not worshipping God appropriately. Paul seems to imply that the ungodly consciously exchanged the truth of God for a lie in their turn to idolatry (1:23). This of course is a difficult proposition to maintain in mission work, but that's another issue.

Once they have started down this path, however, God "abandoned them" to the desires of their hearts. Somewhat curiously to us, Paul immediately seems to turn to sexual sins. He somehow sees a connection between at least some forms of sexual immorality and idolatry. This of course would be easily explainable if he has temple prostitution in mind, but it seems questionable whether, for example, the kind of homosexual sex he goes on to mention was primarily to be found in conjunction with pagan temples. I rather doubt it myself.

It is generally agreed that Paul is drawing some of his imagery and thought here from the book of Wisdom. Wisdom 14:12 says that "the idea of making idols was the beginning of porneia." Wisdom rails against the stupidity of praying to a piece of wood. Like Paul, it points to a failure of "knowing God": "Then it has not pleased them [simply] to err concerning the knowledge of God, but also living in a great battle of ignorance they call such great evils peace" (14:22). The beginning of every evil is the worship of idols (14:27).

So, because they dishonored God by worshipping idols, Paul says, God abandons them to all sorts of sexual sins. He uses homosexual sex as an example of the kind of shameful behavior that has resulted from an appropriate understanding of God (Rom. 1:27). It is very difficult for us to follow this logic, but this seems to be the train of thought.

But sexual sins of this sort are not the only consequences of a fundamental failure to recognize God as God. Humanity abandoned by God falls into unrighteousness (adikia), wickedness (poneria), covetousness (pleonexia), evil (kakia), full of envy (phthonos), murder (phonos), strife (eris), deceit (dolos), craftiness (kakoetheia), gossips (psithyristes), slanderers (katalalos), God-haters (theostyges), insolent (hybristes), arrogant (hyperephanos), boastful (alazona), devisers of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding (asynetos), without faith (asynthetos), without heart (astorgos), without mercy (aneleemos).

Paul concludes the chapter with somewhat of a generalization. Humanity should have known the "just standard" or "righteous judgment" (dikaioma) of God. What is this standard of rightness? It is "that those who practice such things are worthy of death." Instead, humanity applauded those who practice such things.

What does Romans 1 tell us about sin?

1. As far as definitions of sin, Paul once again connects intentionality in a very broad way with justice. It seems significant to him that humanity know what is right for God to judge us for wrongdoing. Idolatry and sexual immorality feature prominently in this chapter as key examples of humanity's ungodliness and unrighteousness. Indeed, Paul presents idolatry as the fundamental sin from which all other sins result. Other kinds of sins thus follow from God abandoning humanity to its own desires.

2. Paul is not thinking of the believer in 1:18-32. He speaks to humanity under the wrath of God. He primarily has Gentiles in mind, even though he doesn't say so. To some extent, this passage is a "sting operation" to set up the hypocritical individual who calls himself a Jew in Romans 2.

3. For our purposes, the sins of this chapter are generic sins that Paul finds contemnable whether one is a believer or non-believer. Whatever theoretical constructs he may argue for subsequently in relation to the law and the power of sin, the sins of Romans 1 remain a constant in Paul's theology. Although he is not talking about believers in chapter 1, he believes that all who practice such things, believer or non-believer, are worthy of death.

Homosexuality and the Bible 2: Countryman

For most evangelicals, the texts of Leviticus, Romans, 1 Corinthians, and 1 Timothy are pretty obvious in meaning in relation to homosexual sex:

Lev. 18:22: "You will not lie with a male as you bed with a woman--it is an abomination."

Lev. 20:13: "The man who lies with a male as with a woman--it is an abomination. Take the two, dying they will die. Their blood is upon them."

Romans 1:26-27: "For this reason, God handed them over to dishonorable passions, for even their females exchanged the natural use for the unnatural. And similarly, even the males, leaving the natural use of the female, burned in their desire toward one another--males with males doing that which is shameful and receiving among themselves the punishment which is required for their error."

1 Cor. 6:9: "Do you not know that ... nor malakoi, nor arsenokoitai ... will inherit the kingdom of God."

1 Tim. 1:9-10: "Since we know this, that the law does not exist for the innocent but for the lawless: ... adulterers, arsenokoitai ..."

For most evangelicals, these verses seem very straightforward and seem to have a fairly obvious meaning: that the Bible consistently considers homosexual sex to be against God's will. It seems to me that this is the right interpretation. All these Scriptures refer to males having sex with males, and Romans 1 also refers to Lesbian relationships.

You might be surprised, however to learn of some of the interpretations, both scholarly and more popular, that have been advanced with alternative understandings. I wish to address these as fairly as I can in the next few posts. If we are right in our interpretation, as I believe we mostly are, then we have no reason to be defensive or to have a chip on our shoulder. And if we had turned out to be wrong, then we would have needed to accept that, right?

This latter truth is very revealing, I think. While I believe evangelicals have correctly understood these passages for the most part, I think that a lot of the emotion and anger associated with the issue belies a certain kind of culture that is independent of the issue. It is the same kind of emotion and anger that would ensue if I started arguing we shouldn't have American flags on the pulpits of our churches. It is a cultural package that has little to do with God. In this case it is mainly a coincidence that these cultural sentiments happen to coincide with the right biblical interpretation!

Sometimes when I am discussing my understanding of various passages on women in the New Testament, a person will bring up the bluff that my hermeneutic would lead us to accept homosexuality as well. Of course I disagree, as does William Webb in his recent book Slaves, Women, and Homosexuality. There are a number of significant differences between the two issues.

Yet this argument makes me smile. The process of determining points of continuity and discontinuity between the biblical world and our world is beyond reasonable doubt. IF that process implied that the Bible's teaching did not work its way out in our world on this issue the same way it did in their world, then the implication would not be that our hermeneutic was wrong. The implication would have to be that our position on homosexuality was wrong!

Argument 1: William Countryman: Impure, not Sinful
Countryman argued in his 1988 book, Dirt, Greed and Sex, that the Levitical holiness codes were about purity and impurity and that Paul no longer considered these dynamics to be in force.

This argument is often leveled at the use of Leviticus on this issue. So it is often pointed out that Leviticus 19, just one chapter over, says not to trim the edges of your beard (19:27) or wear clothing that mixes linen and cloth (19:19). Most Christians don't have problems with goatees or polyester. What gives?

Although I don't know if Countryman mentions this, but it also occurs to me that much of the clean/unclean legislation functions from a worldview where the things of the world belong in certain places and don't belong in others ("after its kind"). Blood belongs in not out. Eels don't have fins and are unclean. Snakes don't have legs and are unclean. Birds that don't fly just aren't right. Male parts go with female parts and so forth.

However, even if all of this is true, the fact remains that Paul considers all the sexual prohibitions of the OT to be in force. Paul doesn't require circumcision--wow! He doesn't require Gentiles to keep the Jewish sabbath--who knew!! But he retains with force all the sexual prohibitions of the OT. You might accuse him of inconsistency, but this is what he does.

It would be an incorrect reading of Paul to think that because he says we are not under law that the law is no longer relevant to Christian life. Quite the contrary. It is a Luther misunderstanding of Paul. Paul affirms a certain universal core of the law that he refers to in one place as "Christ's law." And the difference for him between before and after is more that we are able to keep this law after the Spirit arrives, while we were unable to before.

I'm not sure what Countryman does with 1 Corinthians 6:9 (I can imagine something like some of the options I will discuss subsequently). But if Paul refers to those who engage in homosexual relations (arsenokoitai), then he considers such habits enough to keep one out of the kingdom of God. That would undermine Countryman's whole argument.

Countryman's argument with regard to Romans 1 is that Paul is is strictly speaking of impurity rather than sinfulness, setting up a self-righteous Jew in chapter 2, and thus that Paul doesn't actually consider male-male relations in Romans 1 inappropriate. He is starting with where the audience is, as he often does, in order to modify their understanding. So he starts with their categories of clean and unclean and then moves to abolish the applicability of the categories.

1 Cor. 6:9 in itself would prevent this interpretation. Even so, it is very difficult to see how Paul can approve of something he puts in the category of "what happens when you don't acknowledge God as God and he hands you over to dishonorable passions." And why does Paul speak of "punishment"? With all respect to Countryman, I just don't think this argument works.

More to come...